But it’s still not smartest thing to do. It’s obviously risky—as Tony Stewart knew well before he broke his leg Monday night at a half-mile dirt track in Iowa.

Now Stewart’s chances to win the 2013 Sprint Cup championship are gone. The more than 100 people who work at Stewart-Haas Racing have to be deflated over losing that opportunity to win a title. Sponsors are now paying Stewart to sit on the sidelines while someone else drives his racecar.

Stewart’s injury is a painful reminder that every time a driver steps into a racecar, they take the risk of injury. It’s a bigger risk than most people take in their daily lives. Yes, accidents happen on the road every day, but passenger cars don’t hit walls as hard or flip as violently on the street as racecars do on the racetrack.

In some ways, it shouldn’t even be their decision to take that risk.

Team owners and sponsors know that drivers can get hurt. They take that risk just by being part of the sport.

A couple of years ago, Rick Hendrick saw highlights on CNN of his driver Kasey Kahne flipping a sprint car at Williams Grove (Pa.) Speedway in 2011. He didn’t like what he saw and asked Kahne to curb his hobby.

That’s hard to do, and Kahne is not contractually obligated (yet) not to race sprint cars. But you can’t blame Hendrick for taking that stance. Other owners have considered it as well.

When an owner and sponsor spend millions on a driver, it is well within their rights to try to mitigate the risks their drivers take during the week.

If they do allow them to race, what are the drivers going to do? Just say no?

Kahne owns a sprint-car team, just like Stewart. For those guys to say those cars are too dangerous for them to race would be hypocritical.

But there is a difference when they have a responsibility to others beyond themselves.

If they race with other teams, they disregard the time and effort their NASCAR crews put into the chance to win a championship by going to race on dirt or other tracks.

NASCAR teams want their drivers to stay sharp. Racing other vehicles can provide a chance for them to hone their skills. Obviously even racing a NASCAR Nationwide Series car is risky, but it doesn’t just allow a driver to hone his skills, it also can help his Cup team by adding track time during a race weekend.

The bottom line: Does the risk outweigh the reward?

Granted, it would be unacceptable to ask drivers to barricade themselves in their homes from Monday through Thursday, with no other physical activity.

Their participation in those short-track events is a huge benefit to the sport (and possibly even their sponsors). Their presence brings in fans to a style of racing they love and one that can help build fans for NASCAR.

So it’s not like they don’t have good reasons for doing it.

What makes it hard for “us mortals”—as Stewart called fans and the media last week when talking about his previous sprint-car crash—to understand is that in other sports, there is no moonlighting or extracurricular games or races.

You don’t see Lebron James playing in another basketball league during the offseason. You don’t hear about Tom Brady putting his body at risk on the field except during NFL practice games, the regular season and the playoffs. Most play only sparingly during the preseason for fear of injury.

But racecar drivers can’t just get enough. They’re just not wired to sit still. And frankly, for most, the Sprint Cup Series is too political, too commercialized and too high profile for their tastes.

Racing away from the bright lights and big money brings them back to their roots. It’s what their heroes did and what attracted them to racing in the first place. It’s what energizes them for the NASCAR weekend.

That’s all well and good. But could they be a little more selective? If you they flip a sprint car twice in three weeks, as Stewart did prior to Monday night, is it just circumstance or is it a sign that maybe he is fatigued and needs a break?

The one thing you can say about Stewart is that he was in a vehicle he knows well. He races them all the time. So in some ways, if he’s going to race during his off time, he should race the same vehicles often and race enough that his skills in that vehicle are fresh.

But if Stewart makes the Chase for the Sprint Cup, he should cut back on those activities. For 26 weeks, he and his team performed well enough to put them in position to win a championship. Just as he might change his training regimen to be at the top of his game for the Chase, it might be worth keeping his drivers suit in the Cup hauler.

That isn’t a guarantee he won’t get hurt. His fishing boat could overturn in the middle of the lake. A driver could run him off the road while he is biking.

But Stewart and other drivers should remember the risks they take when stepping into a racecar. Whether it’s a Cup car, a Nationwide car, a truck, a dirt late model or a winged sprint car, there are risks.

And know this: You could suffer an injury that could prevent you from racing your Sprint Cup car for an extended period of time, costing everyone around you.